Tag: values

Foundations for Your Family

Family is not an important thing. It’s everything. Michael J. Fox

What is the foundation of a family? Have you thought about it? What about the foundation of your own family? The course of afamily is set by the man and woman over that family. We all like to say that family is the most important thing, but do we treat our family with the value that we say?

Father and son

When my wife and I were dating and through our engagement we talked about how we wanted to wanted to raise our family. We talked about traditions that we wanted to set. Also we discussed the things that we didn’t want to include as a part of our family.

Your family is like a house, it needs a strong foundation Click To Tweet

This was like us building a house from the ground up. Our marriage is the house and the things that we discussed are our blueprints for our house. I know that everyone may not have the opportunity to do this when they start their family, and that’s okay. Life goes through stages and through each stage we have to make sure that our foundation is set. Here are threeways, no matter what stage of life you’re in, to set the proper foundation.

  1. Assess what’s important

It should go without saying, but it’s too easy to drift through the stages of life. Think about it: what was important to you in your twenties is not necessarily what was important in your thirties, forties or fifties. Let’s switch it up; what was important when you were single, may not be as important after starting a family. And all those factors  change when your kids grow up and leave the house. If you want a good foundation for the stage that you’re in, then asses what’s important at your current stage. 

  1. A consistent prayer life

The foundation of every family should be a consistent prayer life. Not all of us are raised in church, even if we are: there comes a time where we have to take our relationship with God seriously.

That being said, a consistent prayer life will carry you through every phase of life. It’s essential for the stability that we need. I wrote more about our prayer lives here. 

  1. Values

Along with a consistent prayer life, our families should have a set of values that we live by. If you asked most people, they would tell you that they have a set of values that they live by, but if you press them to give examples they would tell you things that sound good. Not what they actually live by. For example, if you want to treat everyone as equals, then you have to model that to your family. It has to be established that everyone is treated fairly, even when it doesn’t benefit you. Values  aren’t assumed, but taught by example.

 

Discussion Question:

What phase of life are you in? What’s your foundation for this phase?

 

Leave your answer in the comments below.

 

Thanksgiving vs Black Friday

I pray that you had a great Thanksgiving. Hopefully we made more memories than grievances. Thanksgiving has changed so much that Black Friday almost is its own holiday. Hopefully you enjoyed it to the fullest. It is funny to me how we can be thankful one day and then stampede over other people to go shopping and catch a deal the very next day.

As I write this post, I’m sitting at the dining room table at my mother’s house. I can proudly say that we did not do any Black Friday shopping this year. It was a really good day, we were able to eat leftovers, go to the movies and relax the whole day.

Value People

Spending the day in another person’s company is a lost art. Having this time together with my family showed me that it should not be just about the deals and monetary things.

The above quote is something that I came across and I thought it was a good reminder for the season that we are in. With Black Friday following Thanksgiving, we can quickly forget what we are thankful for and it shouldn’t be that way.

What Others See

This quote just shows us one way on how to raise children with values. This quote could apply to every relationship that we have. If we want to be have good friendships, then spend twice as much time with those people and half as much money. It makes sense if we think about it. Those things that are valuable to us require time and not just money.

Money can’t fix everything. The things that we value in life need our time. They need our attention. We can’t simply say that we want to have good relationships, a successful marriage, raise good children, all of those things require our time.

There are people that watch everything that we do. Not just our children, but our neighbors, extended family, and everything that we post on social media are all eyes watching us. What we put out there matters. There are so many people that are watching us.

We can be double minded and not realize it. We will say things like we value family and spending time with those that we love on Thanksgiving then not even 24 hours later we are running people over  for a new tv, while our kids our watching us??? Why do everything we can and end up being the meanest person on Black Friday for a deal on a new tv.

Discussion Question: How do you model your values?